Renault finalising software update worth 'tenths a lap'

Having trialled a new software update at last week's in-season test at Silverstone, the Renault powered teams continued to see progress during the first two practice sessions ahead of the German Grand Prix.

Already at Silverstone, teams and drivers were happy with the updates brought by Renault, even though the change needs some further tweaking before being completely ready.

Renault's head of track operations, Rémi Taffin is optimistic there is considerable improvement on the way.

"We ran the latest wave of software across all cars and the improvements have been noticeable in the ICE output power", the Frenchman said.

"Today has been a very interesting day from a Power Unit point of view. We ran the latest wave of software across all cars and the improvements have been noticeable in the ICE output power. We were confident that the software would work well after trialing at the Silverstone test and yet again we have seen the results corroborated here today. We also expect a further step tomorrow when we have looked at all the data thoroughly."

Back at Silverstone, Pastor Maldonado for instance said that the update made it feel like there were two engines in his car, indicating the apparent difference the update makes. And indeed, Taffin said the update is not marginal: "we are not talking hundredths, we are talking about tenths a lap".

Taffin further said none of its engines in action today had problems coping with the heat.

The only issues of the day were with Caterham as Marcus Ericsson first had to stop for a while with a drop of oil pressure in FP2. Kamui Kobayashi meanwhile had an oil leak on his car that was at the time fitted with "an old engine".

Taffin further added that Renault will trial a new fuel mixture from Total on most of its cars which should give "another good step in engine performance".